After the first sprouts of my tomato plant started appearing, the 3D printer was finished. The first thing I did was toss the random garbage into the bin to produce printing materials. It was fun at first. The time to scoop up the trash, cut it down, and toss it into the hopper made it boring quick.

Before long, it felt like work, and I was tired of it. Jim recommended making clips like the ones used on the covered platform to test out the machine and calibrate it. I was amenable to that suggestion, especially since I wouldn’t need to destroy any more of my dwindling rope supply. The clips were relatively simple U-shaped pieces made of junk recycled polymer with a barb inside the U tips. As the clip slid into each platform’s matched-up holes, it made a loud snapping sound when the barb slid past the lower part of the frame. That was it. Nothing else needed to be done, and the platforms were secured together.

I wasn’t sure what to do with the rope pieces that were left over, but I’d saved a lot of the ‘sleeves’ of the rope that I’d de-threaded and had an idea. Using the printer, I created two plastic bars about a meter long. This was only possible because Jim added a sliding tray that would allow me to extend the printed surface area. A meter was about as long as the sliding tray would extend.

Like my net, I made holes in the bar equidistant apart and secured the rope sleeves. Afterward, I wove those lines together until I was ready to tie the opposite ends to the other bar. Using the recovered ropes, I tied four to each end of the bars and then two to each pole on the bow side of my raft. Now, I had a hammock. It was a glorious thing—a hammock. Jim felt I was wasting resources and time, but what the fuck did a little eye-bot know?

“You just cursed me silently, didn’t you?” Jim asked.

“Yes. I fucking called you an Eye-Bot.”

“You’re a fucking idiot.”

“Whatever, you’re a multi-tool.”

“Fuck off.”

“Hey, Eye-Phone, make a call for me.”

“Do I look like a secretary?”

I sighed pathetically while relaxing in my hammock.

“I suppose not. There is only one thing you can be.”

“I’m going to hate myself for asking,” Jim said. “But what one thing?”

“An Eye-Watch, because that’s all you know how to do, you retarded Eye-Bot.”

Jim gave me the stink eye, which only made me chuckle more.

“Let’s play a game,” Jim said, and I looked at him cautiously.

“Okay…”

“Let’s play Eye Spy.”

“Pfft,” I burst out laughing, and it took a few minutes for me to calm down. “Fine, what do you spy?”

“A human corpse.”

“You threatening me?”

“Nope, play the game.”

“Shit,” I sighed, already knowing where this was going. Looking over, sure enough, half a body was floating about five meters from my raft. Its lower half was bitten off by what looked to be one of those sharks. “How come the only humans I meet here are all dead?”

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“In my experience, dead humans are the most trustworthy,” Jim claimed.

“That’s a very cynical outlook on life.”

“Cynical is grounded in belief, which makes it seem like faith. The type of thing a religious fanatic would ascribe to, not a logical machine that evaluates facts and numbers. Based on statistics, what I just said was true, so it can’t be cynical if it’s an indisputable truth.”

I wasn’t sure what Jim said and didn’t have a counterargument.

“You should print me a spear with a hook on it so I can snag things like this out of the water.”

“Honestly, that’s not a bad idea. Not for your reasoning, but there are predators in the water, and you need something more substantial than that puny knife to protect you. For now, use your anchor.”

“Why? Can’t we just let it float away? That shit is disgusting.”

I sighed but proceeded to pull the half-corpse over. I didn’t want to taint my anchor in human blood and viscera, but it was more appealing than jumping into the water with that thing.

Swinging my anchor, I launched at the corpse and missed. Pulling it back in, I attempted it again and hit the side of its head before sinking into the—

BOOM!

The corpse exploded, sending water, blood, and bone everywhere. It wasn’t a powerful explosion, but it knocked me on my ass.

“See!? Should have stayed in my fucking hammock!” I shouted while pulling bits of brain out of my hair. Thankfully, that was the only thing that reached me or the raft—other than the concussive part of the blast. Most of the bone shrapnel was blasted downward into the water or caught by the waves.

“You have some explaining to do,” I told Jim.

“Huh? What do I need to explain about an exploding corpse? You think I did that?”

“No. You cynical asshat. You claimed dead humans were more trustworthy than living ones—that!” I pointed toward the mess in the sea. “Differs from your opinion. What facts and other nonsense? You talk a good talk, but the reality is you don’t understand humans at all.”

Jim remained silent and comprehended what I’d told him. I could practically see his circuits smoking as he tried to compute the new reality he faced.

“Forget it,” I told him and saw something floating in the water. Using my net, I scooped it up, and Jim finally came out of my shoulder.

“If you make another eye joke, our ending will become a murder-suicide!” Jim said.

“What? It’s just another Eye-Dent…” I claimed, emphasizing the ‘I’ part. Jim looked at me, and I looked at him. We remained in a deadlock stare for a few minutes before the I-Dent card in my hand grew warm. “What’s happening to it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do these things have a self-destruct?” I asked, then wondered if this same tech was in that body that exploded. “What do I do, Jim?”

“Relax. At worst, it melts down. There is no way that thing can explode like that body just did. Put it in some water, and I’ll measure the temperature. It should prevent it from melting, and if the water boils, we can just dump it over the side.”

I didn’t have a better idea, so I followed Jim’s advice.

“Jim, start a new mission.”

“Huh?” Jim extended out as far as he could to face me directly. “It’s been a long time since you’ve issued one of those.”

“Yes. I need to know what the fuck is going on with this planet. Make the mission non-aggressive for now—at least until we have more information. Spying, infiltration, and other information-gathering methods are acceptable. Even killing and torture as long as they don’t tip off anyone we are watching, it’s fine.”

“You sure?”

“Why?”

“You’ve retired for several years now. Are you sure you want to do this?”

“People seem to have forgotten who the Fa—Infamous Pirate Bones is. I like infamous better, so we’ll stick with that. Time to make them remember.”

“And Blackeye?”

“Heh, leave him be for now.”

“And the thing he is after?”

“Oh? You figured something out?”

“Just now. That man had an ocular implant similar to the one you have hidden inside the pod. The one we thought was probably useless. After recreating the explosion, it definitely originated from that eye.”

“How is that relevant?”

“It’s similar tech to the I-Dents.”

“What is it you want? Stop beating around the bush.”

“If it is, I might be able to assimilate it.”

“What are the chances it erases you?”

“Zero. My tech is better than a Bio-Core used by mech pilots. All that cybernetic would do is provide a potential firmware upgrade. I’m almost positive I’d gain access to their communication and information networks.”

“First, issue the mission. We’ll evaluate the eye later. I trust your ability, but that doesn’t mean there won’t be any issues. I don’t want to give away our location just yet.”

“Why?”

“I’m still exposed and vulnerable here. I’m not ready to die yet. Once I can safely leave this planet, we’ll figure it out.”